Sebastien Loeb leads in Rally of New Zealand

World champion Sebastien Loeb will take a 6.4-second lead over Citroen team-mate Mikka Hirvonen into tomorrow’s final day of the Rally New Zealand.

Loeb started the second day with a four second lead over Hirvonen and kept a fluctuating advantage throughout the day to stay on target for only his third win in New Zealand, among his 71 wins on the World Rally Championship, and his first since 2008.

“It was not an easy day but we are leading at the moment,” said Loeb. “We had the right tyres to attack when we did so no problem there but I do not have many soft tyres left for the rest of the race.”

Conditions were sunny as Solberg started the day on softs, while Loeb elected for softs on the front, hard on the rear.

The Citroen teammates seem the only drivers still in contention to win with seven stages remaining on Sunday.

“Here we are two days down and still in a proper fight so I’m having a good time,” Hirvonen said.

The DS3 WRC drivers are 1m33s ahead of their nearest rival Petter Solberg, but Matton is concerned that the Norwegian will be a major threat in the damp conditions predicted for Sunday because he has more soft tyres available after using hards instead on Friday morning.